Distribution of Visual Attention in High-Risk and Dynamic Environment: An Eye-Tracking Study with Submarine Team Leaders

Distribution of visual attention in high-risk and dynamic environment is an important issue for safety since missed or delayed information detection is a significant factor of accidents. In complex socio-technical systems operators need to draw their attention on numerous visual displays, yet auditory information from verbal exchanges plays also a major role in the development of their situation awareness. Team leaders may then develop strategies to gather information both from visual and auditory sources. The aim of our study was to identify how team leader’s attention is distributed among visual displays and interactions with team members as a function of their level of performance during a highly demanding situation. Ten leaders from the Diving-Safety Team in French nuclear submarine were equipped with a mobile eye-tracker in a full scale simulator during training sessions. Areas Of Interest were grouped into four categories: technical displays, navigation displays, team members and written documentation. Two critical AOIs related to two failures were analyzed. Our results showed that most part of leaders’ attention was directed toward interface displays (78% of all dwells). Significant differences showed that high-performance leaders performed more frequent visual scanning and were also able to monitor longer and more frequently critical AOI. The allocation of attention showed that high-performance leaders directed more frequently their attention on commandment team members suggesting a higher level of hindsight on the situation. Further research is needed to identify more accurately the distribution of attention between visual and auditory channel in relation with situation awareness.